R. Kelly’s criminal trial has begun. Here’s a timeline of the sexual misconduct accusations he has faced over the past 30 years.
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00:00There was the craziness with Aaliyah.
00:29There was a marriage certificate that said he'd married her when she was 18 and he was
00:3427, except she was 15 and that was in all the press surrounding the debut album that
00:40he had written and produced for her, which he called Age Ain't Nothin' But a Number.
01:00Everybody seems to think that y'all are either girlfriend or boyfriend or cousins.
01:04No, we're not related at all.
01:06No, we're not.
01:07We're just very close.
01:08He's my best friend.
01:09Man, cool.
01:10In the whole wide world.
01:11In the whole wide world.
01:29There were whispers throughout the music community throughout Chicago, the black and the black
01:43communities of the South and West sides that Kelly would often cruise high schools and
01:49the Rock and Roll McDonald's and the Evergreen Plaza shopping mall.
02:29Many people will assume that means you were guilty.
02:49Why'd you settle?
02:50At the time, I had a lot of good things in my life going on musically.
02:53This is not a good time to go to court over something like that.
02:57So if you settle, it'd be better.
03:28Six years has been long enough.
03:42We want no more delays.
03:44We want him prosecuted now.
03:54I love R. Kelly and I know he didn't do it.
03:56I know that's not him.
03:58They just want to bring him down and kill his image.
04:00We want him in jail.
04:01There's a tape of him urinating and having sex with a young girl.
04:11Yes, he was acquitted.
04:17But the jurors who saw that video were horrified.
04:21It is the most disgusting and horrible thing I've ever seen in my life.
04:29Do you like teenage girls?
04:33When you say teenage, how are we talking?
04:37Girls who are teenagers.
04:39Nineteen?
04:40Nineteen and younger.
04:43I have some 19-year-old friends.
04:45Got a new album coming out.
04:48Yeah?
04:49What's it called?
05:21She trains you to please him sexually.
05:24Went out there to his tour bus and you have him naked and you have her naked.
05:28He told me to look at her and he said, she's going to teach you everything you need to
05:33know.
05:34Black girls matter!
05:35Black girls matter!
05:36I can't get it out of my mind.
05:50What I saw and what happened.
05:52I want to send a message to anyone who believes she was a victim of R. Kelly's.
06:00Victims should not be ashamed.
06:02Forty-eight women cannot be lying.
06:06Women that I've talked to for 19 years of reporting across the country, separated by
06:11decades, telling the same story, who have never met each other, cannot all be lying.
06:41What are the lies that you're hearing that disturb you most?
06:51Got little girls trapped in the basement, handcuffing people, starving people.
06:55I have a harem, what you call it, a cult.
06:59That's your explanation, they're lying on you.
07:01Absolutely.
07:02I'm fighting for my f***ing life!
07:11This man is the worst predator in the history of popular music, an art form with a long
07:38and ignoble history of men treating women badly.
07:48I was a young girl, the age of 17, walking in the mall, who just wanted to be someone.
07:54Unfortunately, I was preyed upon by Mr. Kelly and his enterprise.
07:59Healing is possible.
08:00I am strong.
08:01I lived it.
08:02I survived it.
08:04And now I seek justice.
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